Chapter 2
Ellie walked into the house, and she nodded towards Jesse’s parents. His mother, Robin, came up to her and gave her a hug, “you, okay?”
“Yea, fine. I…” Ellie trails off not sure what to tell Robin, would she care? Would she feel more like Dina about just putting everything behind them.
“Wherever you have been, that was for you,” Robin says into Ellie’s hair. Ellie nods and pulls out of the hug.
Ellie looks around, “where’s…”
“Upstairs,” Dina says, “come on.”
Dina goes up the stairs and Ellie follows they walk up quietly. Dina pushes a door open, and Ellie sees JJ babbling away in his crib, “he’s gotten so big,” Ellie says wonderingly.
“You’ve been gone for months,” Dina says, “babies grow.”
Ellie nods, and heads over to JJ and she goes to pick him up, but just as she begins to pick him up JJ begins to cry hard.
“What’s wrong?” Ellie asks worried.
“He doesn’t like strangers right now,” Dina explains going to JJ and picking him up and getting him resettled.
“Oh,” Ellie says she has been gone for months and she would be a stranger to JJ.
After Dina got JJ resettled, she put him back and his crib, and motioned for Ellie to follow her back out of the room. Dina took Ellie’s hand and walked across the hall and opens the door and Ellie follows and Dina closes the door.
Dina takes Ellie’s pack and sets it down and takes Ellie’s injured hand, “what happened?”
Ellie takes her hand back, “I found Abby and we got into a fight and… she bit them off.”
“Ouch,” Dina says, but she continues to exam Ellie’s hands when she gets to the fresh bite, “is that…”
“Yea, but it happened weeks ago, I can’t…I’m not…” Ellie rushes to explain.
“You’re immune, I remember,” Dina says with a small sad smile.
“Yea, I am,” Ellie agrees.
“I’ve been thinking about you leaving a lot, these last months,” Dina says, “I am still angry at you for leaving. But I am happy that you are back. And honestly, you do look healthier than I have seen you in a while.”
“Yea something about going after Abby, I finally managed to let go of my guilt. About Joel dying. I close my eyes and see something other than Joel after she killed him.”
“You have nothing to feel guilty about. Okay? Joel, you said it yourself, he crossed a lot of people.”
“He died because he saved me,” Ellie interrupts.
“What?” Dina asks.
Ellie begins pacing, “before we came to Jackson we went to a firefly hospital in Salt Lake, there was a doctor there. He said that he could make a cure.”
“A cure?” Dina says incredulously.
“Yea, whatever makes me immune, the doctor could make a cure from me.”
“Then why?” Dina asks.
Ellie is looking down at her hands rubbing them together nervously, “the cure would have meant them dissecting my brain. I don’t know. They would have had to kill me and Joel… well Joel didn’t let them. He… Abby’s father was the doctor… Joel… he… he killed everyone who was in the hospital that day.”
Dina is openly staring at Ellie and Ellie looks away, worried that Dina is gonna judge Joel for what he did. Maybe she’ll think that Abby and her friends had a point. Ellie continues talking, “it took Joel and I a year to get to the hospital and it was hell getting across the country. He couldn’t… I wish he had… Okay… Dina… Joel did what he thought was best… I think he felt like… I wish hadn’t done it, okay. Then everything wouldn’t…”
“You… that’s why you had been so angry with Joel before he died. He didn’t tell you about what happened. That random camping trip you took, you came back so angry with him.”
“He told me for years that there had been dozens of immunes and that the fireflies had given up. And I wanted to believe him, but I didn’t. Not the first time he told me it, not the dozenth time. I wanted to know, so I went to Salt Lake. Found the truth, the doctor was the only who could do it.”
“That’s why you yelled at him at the dance,” Dina says.
“I was so angry at him for lying to me. For not letting the fireflies… and I told him stay out of my life. I didn’t mean it, I went and saw him that night and I wanted to forgive him, but she killed him before he and I could be good again.”
“Let me get this straight. You were angry with Joel for not letting the fireflies killing you to make some Hail Mary cure?”
“Don’t you get it, Dina? If he had just left the hospital all of this might different. JJ would have grown up with… Jesse would still be alive. And he would have grown up with runners and clickers and shamblers and the rest would have just been a scary story. Nothing more. It would have been better because everyone would still be alive.”
Dina gets up from the bed she had been sitting on and crosses to Ellie and wraps her into a hug. And despite everything, Ellie feels herself break down in Dina’s arms. Her cries were deep and gut wrenching. Dina moves them to the bed and she them lays down, Dina strokes Ellie’s hair and lets her cry. Ellie manages to cry herself to sleep. She had thought that she had cried all her tears that day in Santa Barbara, but everything had come back, and she cried.
When Dina was sure that Ellie was asleep, she moved herself out from under Ellie and went to go check on JJ, she was surprised to see Robin in his room, she was rocking with JJ in her arms.
“Is Ellie, okay?” Robins asks.
“I… I think she will be, but I don’t know...” Dina says, there is so much she can’t discuss with Robin, she couldn’t tell Ellie’s secret.
“I expect you’ll forgive her sooner rather than later, will you both go back to the farmhouse?” Robin asks.
“I…not right away, I think I need time. I think we both do. But I still want to be with her,” Dina tells Robin honestly.
“I understand, and while you are working it out, you will always be welcomed here,” Robin tells her sweetly.
“Thank you,” Dina says, “would you mind keeping an ear out for this one, I need to go out for a few. I’ll be back soon.”
“Sure thing, is everything okay?”
“Nothing to worry about,” Dina says.
“Alright, if you’re sure,” Robin says, “what would you like to tell Ellie if she wakes up?”
“That I’ll be back soon.”
Robin nods and with that Dina heads out of the house and she walked and ended up in the little graveyard, before she had made a conscience decision to do so. She found Joel easy enough and sits. She looks at the headstone, “thanks, Joel.” She can’t imagine not knowing Ellie. And Joel’s actions made that possible. She knows that if it had been JJ, she would have made the same choice.
“Dina?” Maria calls out.
Dina whips her head around, “Maria, hey.” Dina stands back up, “I was just…”
“She told you, huh?” Maria says it wasn’t a question. Or accusation. Dina shrugs, not committing to an answer either way, “I’m glad that girl’s been through a lot. I’m glad she’s got someone she wanted to tell.”
“Yea?” Dina asks. And she begins thinking about Maria and Ellie’s relationship, Maria was protective of Ellie, she had smoothed out a lot of things when Joel and Ellie came to Jackson.
“I’ve had mixed feelings about Joel’s choices since outbreak day. What he’s done,” Maria admits, “but this one. I can’t imagine having made a different choice, maybe that’s why the original plan had been to use a smuggler. Someone who wasn’t attached. Maybe life for the rest of us would have been better if Joel had walked away.”
“How can you say that?” Dina snaps.
“You were born after Outbreak Day, you don’t know what life was like in the before, maybe life would have been better. There might have been a cure, but you’ve seen a lot of the country to, no QZs but you’ve seen what we do to each other. A cure might have been made, but I can’t see that it would have been distributed without reservation. That it would have been given to all. It would have been Outbreak Day again, worst in humanity on display.”
“So, you don’t think it was a mistake? You think Joel did the right thing?” Dina asks.
“I think I have known them for years and I still have never gotten the full story of their trek across the country. And I know from Tommy that Joel was an amazing dad to Sarah, and I know that he saw Ellie as a daughter. I think he made a father’s choice, and I don’t hold grudges on that front.”
Dina and Maria look on at Joel’s gravestone before Maria spoke again handing a package to Dina, “it’s for Ellie. For her hand, I don’t know what it will look like in a year or two, but it should help. I think that Joel’s insistence that no one knows was a good call.”
Dina takes the package and nods, “I’ll make sure she gets it.”
Ellie stirs and she notices that she is in an unfamiliar bed, but there is a faint smell that was distinctly Dina, but looking around she notices that Dina is nowhere to be found, she sits up and sighs. It’s late, and she makes her way across the hall and opens the door softly. JJ is in his crib fast asleep. Ellie sits on chair in the room and just watches him sleep. She had missed watching him sleep. It was always peaceful.
Speaking softly, “hey big boy, it’s me, Ellie. I know I’ve been away for a long time. But I’m back and I’m not going anywhere. I’m still gonna teach you how to play guitar. I don’t know how,” Ellie says holding up her mangled hand, “but I’m gonna figure it out, cause Joel taught me and I’m gonna teach you. I promise I’m not gonna leave again. Okay? If you ever need anything. Anything at all, I’m gonna be here for you. And your mom.”
Dina had slipped into the room unheard by Ellie and listened to her talk to JJ. Making promises she intended to keep, and Dina hoped that Ellie really intended to make good on her promises. Because she didn’t want to watch Ellie leave her again.